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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25548169">Val Royeaux</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ModernAgeSomniari/pseuds/ModernAgeSomniari'>ModernAgeSomniari</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Mala Suledin Nadas [7]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Cassandra is focussed, Eli is terrified, Gen, Solas is a bit appalled, Varric is awesome, yay tags</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 10:35:54</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>933</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25548169</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ModernAgeSomniari/pseuds/ModernAgeSomniari</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Just pop to Val Royeaux and meet the Chantry Mothers, they said.  It'll be fine they said.</p>
<p>Forgetting of course that Eli Lavellan has never been near a city before in her entire life.  Good thing she's going with our friendly neighbourhood dwarf - and this is not his first rodeo.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>frienships rule</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Mala Suledin Nadas [7]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1829143</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>14</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Val Royeaux</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">“Breathe, Firefly.Just breathe.”</p>
<p class="p1">She tried to, deep and slow, but the air that filled her lungs was dry and dirty somehow.She felt like she could taste the stone of the paths and all the shit that had landed on it over the long years. Her throat tightened again and she let her thin fingers grip Varric’s shoulder.</p>
<p class="p1">“Varric, it’s so….there are so many….why do they have to build so high?”</p>
<p class="p1">He made an agreeing sort of noise and gently prised her fingers off his coat, wrapping her suddenly cold hand in his big fingers.</p>
<p class="p1">“It’s a dick comparison thing, don’t worry about it.They don’t tend to fall down unless you pelt one with fireballs.”</p>
<p class="p1">“Promise?”</p>
<p class="p1">“Promise.”</p>
<p class="p1">“Those people are looking at me.”</p>
<p class="p1">“You’re an elf walking the road to the Summer Market, Firefly.They’re not used to that being ok.”</p>
<p class="p1">Anger mixed with pride flared hot enough she forgot her nerves for a moment, her head instinctively lifting, but the feeling of the buildings pressing down on her only increased once she’d passed the masked figures peering at her like she couldn’t see them do so. </p>
<p class="p1">She could see where she and her companions were aiming for - a broad avenue of cobblestones and hideously pruned trees, leading up and up towards a curved wall painted garish blue that apparently held the Summer Market.She hated it, hated it even more when they came high enough up the slope to see over a rising wall and she realised there was a Wolf-damned lake in the middle of the city that they had just been underneath.Underneath!</p>
<p class="p1">“What in the name of Fen’Harel’s puckered arsehole are they doing putting a lake here!?And why so high?”</p>
<p class="p1">Solas coughed behind her in what was clearly going to be a laugh at her expense, inexperienced and naive Dalish that she was.At least he had the grace to hide it behind his hand and look away.</p>
<p class="p1">“More dick stuff, Firefly.Just assume that the bigger and more ridiculous something is, the more it’s about dick size.Or coffer size.Or clout.Mostly dick size, though.”</p>
<p class="p1">“You won’t leave me, will you?”</p>
<p class="p1">Cassandra scoffed from beside Solas.</p>
<p class="p1">“It would be foolish of us to do so.I am not about to give the Chantry an opportunity to do something they regret.”</p>
<p class="p1">Eli nodded at her, acknowledging the comment.Then she looked down pleadingly at Varric, who smirked.</p>
<p class="p1">“I will not leave your side for second, oh Herald.”</p>
<p class="p1">She turned her hand in his and squeezed it, a little embarrassingly relieved.</p>
<p class="p1">“You’ve lived your whole life in a city, Varric, you’re very good at comforting someone through being in one for the first time.”</p>
<p class="p1">His smirk faded into something softer and he glanced up at her.</p>
<p class="p1">“You remember I told you I had a Dalish friend?”</p>
<p class="p1">Eli remembered.It was the reason why Varric had known how Eli would want to remember her dead friends from the blast at the Conclave.How he’d known exactly what to arrange so that she could say goodbye as properly as he could make it.She nodded.“Well, she had to come to Kirkwall to live there and I was there to see her to the walls.And into the um, the Alienage.”</p>
<p class="p1">“She chose to live in the Alienage?”</p>
<p class="p1">“She and her Clan weren’t seeing eye to eye but her Keeper wanted my friend and I to keep an eye on her.There was only really one place she could go.”</p>
<p class="p1">Eli knew he was worried about the tense set of her jaw, but now was not the time, not when she was trying desperately not to flee at the first sight of what she assumed were the ‘colonnades’ that one book on shemlen architecture she’d stolen had mentioned.If they had to build so high, did they have to build so thin?At least trees had roots to hold them in place.Think of something else, anything else.</p>
<p class="p1">“Did her Clan leave her there?”</p>
<p class="p1">“Not for a while, no.”</p>
<p class="p1">“Which Clan?”</p>
<p class="p1">He looked up at her and, whilst a casual observer might call his expression neutral, there was something hard and assessing in his eyes.It was strangely reassuring.She smiled and shook her head at him.“Don’t worry.You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want.”</p>
<p class="p1">“You don’t already know?”</p>
<p class="p1">“I suspect I do, but it’s been a good few years since the last Arlathvhen.It doesn’t matter, I was just curious.”</p>
<p class="p1">“I don’t mean anything by it, I just….”</p>
<p class="p1">She leant down to his face, squeezing his hand.She wanted him to see the depth of comfort his reluctance had brought her.</p>
<p class="p1">“You are protecting your friend.Even though you are so different.How could I be offended by that?We have only known each other a little while.That you protect her like that just proves to me you are someone who’s friendship is worth earning.”</p>
<p class="p1">“How’s that?”</p>
<p class="p1">“Because now I know how you’ll protect me if I am ever counted your friend.That is worth more than any Clan name to sate an idle curiosity.”</p>
<p class="p1">She straightened and bumped her hip up against his elbow, hearing him huff out in a slightly bemused laugh.She laughed with him for a moment, until she realised how close the looming hideous wall of blue was.She had to look up to see the top.The laugh died in her throat and she felt his hand squeeze hers as the mass of his body knocked gently into her own.</p>
<p class="p1">“Breathe, Firefly.Just breathe.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Inspiration: Hoo boy but Eli has never EVER been anywhere near a city before.  Like, if the Clan could see the rising walls of Markham in the distance, they were WAY too close kind of never been near a city before.  Varric, as ever, is a dude.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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